Diet and walking, does it really make a difference?
RiiNaCHiiCK09
Posts: 109 Member
So I've been told time and time again that for a person who weighs "more"(whatever more means),the first 20lbs is "easier" than the last 15 lbs for a smaller person.
I'm so sorry if that came out wrong or offensive, but let me get to my point.
Before my son, I was 105 lbs. I am now 120 lbs. Oh and I'm 4' 11" if that helps with anything.
Well, I just started counting calories and walking with my mom. She has lost 25 pounds from that, but she is 5' 4" and starting weight was 212 lbs.
Could just walking and diet help me lose my last 15 lbs? I know jogging would be better, but could walking be as effective for me as it has for my mom?
I'm so sorry if that came out wrong or offensive, but let me get to my point.
Before my son, I was 105 lbs. I am now 120 lbs. Oh and I'm 4' 11" if that helps with anything.
Well, I just started counting calories and walking with my mom. She has lost 25 pounds from that, but she is 5' 4" and starting weight was 212 lbs.
Could just walking and diet help me lose my last 15 lbs? I know jogging would be better, but could walking be as effective for me as it has for my mom?
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Replies
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Absolutely2
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Yes and no. Truth is that diet alone is enough to lose those pounds, but it is more difficult.
But it will be harder for you, or at least take more time, to lose your 15 lbs vs. your Mom because you are so much closer to your "ideal" weight. Yes you can do it, but it will take longer. Same probably goes for running to lose. It would likely still take you longer.
I lost 15 lbs in my first month of weight loss. I have no idea as I'm not there yet, but I'm guessing the last 15 will take 30 weeks or so.
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It will work, but it will take time. Expect 15 lb to take more than 15 weeks - you're probably looking at 4-6 months to be at goal weight.2
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Your mom lost weight by eating fewer calories than she burned. It works the same whether you have 15 pounds to lose or 100 pounds to lose. Those with more to lose sometimes have an easier time because their bodies burn more calories. You will just have to be more diligent about tracking and weighing everything you eat because you have less room for error.10
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I had 30lbs to lose all up, the first 20 came off in 4 months and the last 10 took 10-11 mths if i remember correctly. My food logging wasn't perfect toward the end there though.
I thinking walking is great, it's the only exercise i do. I have my fitbit synced to mfp so i don't have to log any exercise, it's set and forget.4 -
RiiNaCHiiCK09 wrote: »Could just walking and diet help me lose my last 15 lbs? I know jogging would be better, but could walking be as effective for me as it has for my mom?
Of course. Jogging/running is more intensive cardio and so is certainly better for the heart, and it will burn more calories in the same amount of time, as walking, but it's still very exercise and it does burn calories. Get a pedometer (a Fitbit or something of that nature) to give you some extra motivation to walk further!1 -
Absolutely iv lost nearing 85 pounds in 10 months now just eating less and walking more.7
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Walking 10 miles only burns slightly fewer calories than jogging that same 10 miles. When people say that jogging burns more calories than walking, they're usually comparing "for the same amount of time" not "for the same amount of distance".
Walking is a great way to increase your calorie burn and allow you to eat more while still losing weight. It's also good for health. Depending on exact stats, you're looking at burning somewhere in the ballpark of 100 calories per mile walked - probably just under (maybe 80ish?) since you're quite small.
All that said, with your statistics, you're probably looking at 0.5 pounds/week as the fastest healthy weight loss. This is because you are so close to an ideal weight already.3 -
I'll never be a runner, maybe if i was in a hurry to get my exercise in, or in a rush to get from A to B i'd consider it, but until then walking suits me just fine, You can burn a ton of calories too
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I know a lady who lost 150 lbs just walking. The smaller you get the slower it may go but it will still work . Just stick to your calorie goal a d if possible walk brisk.
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A larger body uses more energy than a smaller body. Your BMR is about 1200, while your mothers is about 1600. Your total daily energy expenditure (and hers) will depend on how active you are in your daily life/work/hobbies, and what/how much exercise you do. But she is starting from a higher point. So at the same activity level/exercise level, you might only burn 1800 calories in a day while she might burn 2400. So to aim to lose 2 pounds per week, she can eat 1400 (2400 -1000) but it would be practically impossible for you to aim for 2 pounds a week because a deficit that large would leave you at an unsafe calorie consumption level.
It is not so much about the first 15 vs the last 15 pounds, but about the energy expenditure. A person with a lot to lose, in theory, burns more calories due to having a larger body. A person with a small amount to lose by default has a smaller body.
You CAN lose weight. But because you are smaller overall and burn less, you'll need to aim for .5-1 pound per week. You will also want to be as accurate as possible. That means tracking every calorie you consume, using a food scale for E-V-E-R-Y bite of solid food you eat. And being realistic on what you burn. For you, eating 1200-1400 should be a slight deficit, while eating 1800-2000 will probably make you gain. Your mother on the other hand could lose slowly while eating 1800-2000.RiiNaCHiiCK09 wrote: »So I've been told time and time again that for a person who weighs "more"(whatever more means),the first 20lbs is "easier" than the last 15 lbs for a smaller person.
I'm so sorry if that came out wrong or offensive, but let me get to my point.
Before my son, I was 105 lbs. I am now 120 lbs. Oh and I'm 4' 11" if that helps with anything.
Well, I just started counting calories and walking with my mom. She has lost 25 pounds from that, but she is 5' 4" and starting weight was 212 lbs.
Could just walking and diet help me lose my last 15 lbs? I know jogging would be better, but could walking be as effective for me as it has for my mom?
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Ps, yes walking is great. It is good for your heart/lungs and overall fitness level, but also burns more calories than sitting on your bum for the same amount of time. Burning more calories, when you have a low BMR/small body, is very useful!2
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Yes for sure that's how I started back 5 years ago a walk round the park (two miles) every morning really built my confidence up to sign up at a gym and crank it up a wee bit2
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I belong to a running club where I do a combo of speed walking and light jogging. The last 10-15 lbs can come off by cutting another 200-300 calories off of your daily intake for at least a month. Yes it sucks but it will shock your body into fat burning again. Burning that last fat is so frustrating. I quit smoking but gained 40 pounds with the quit - I'm so glad that life is behind me. Then I joined a fitness center learned weight training and then joined the running club. I'm healthier now than before and I had to learn to accept that the fat does take a lot of time to come off till I get a grip on my eating. Our bodies are all different. I am 5'3" and 145 lbs and still have 25 pounds to lose. Counting every single morsel of food is so important but keeping it up is so hard as I keep rationalizing that I deserve to eat more than I should. Getting that self discipline back is so hard. I can jog but I need to eat less.3
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SusanMFindlay wrote: »Walking 10 miles only burns slightly fewer calories than jogging that same 10 miles. When people say that jogging burns more calories than walking, they're usually comparing "for the same amount of time" not "for the same amount of distance".
Walking is a great way to increase your calorie burn and allow you to eat more while still losing weight. It's also good for health. Depending on exact stats, you're looking at burning somewhere in the ballpark of 100 calories per mile walked - probably just under (maybe 80ish?) since you're quite small.
Exactly what I said. And 100 cal per mile is a good estimate - it's what I have always used.0 -
Its all about calories in vs calories out.0
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It's all about creating a calorie deficit.
Walking can help you do that, and getting more activity in your day is always a good thing. I'm a big fan of walking. But if you don't have a handle on your food intake, all the walking in the world won't do anything for you.2 -
Yeah, as others have explained, WL comes down to a calorie deficit. Think of your starting point as your baseline. Whatever you're doing now in terms of CI (how much you eat) and CO (how much you burn thorugh activity) results in you weighing 120 pounds.
Each pound = 3500 calories. So if your goal is to lose 15 pounds, you need to save/burn 3500 calories 15 times.
As others explained, you won't burn as much from walking as your mom did because as a smaller person, you burn less doing the exact same exercise. Since walking is exercise you hadn't already been doing, it's an extra calorie burn for you beyond your baseline. In other words, if you burn 80 calories from walking a mile, that's still 80 calories that you wouldn't have been burning otherwise. So they count as deficit calories. (Technically, since you would've burned some of those 80 calories just by being alive and sitting on your couch, they're not *all* deficit calories but it's easier and good enough not to think about that lol.)
Since you're already a healthy weight and your norm was a relatively low weight, I'd guess that your CI is probably in a good spot. It doesn't sound to me like you need to make any significant changes in terms of how you eat. To lose weight, you could create your deficit through just walking, but that would take a long time to accumulate 3500 calories 15 times. If you were to hold your original pre-MFP calories steady and simply add in 160 calories a day burned from walking, it would (on paper) take you almost a year to lose 15 pounds.
If you want to increase the speed at which you lose, then you'll either need a higher calorie burn or to drop calories too. In your shoes, I'd probably walk 2 miles daily, set MFP calories to a 0.5lb/ week loss, and not eat back my walking calories. That would cut the time to about 4 months. (Imperfect estimates.)1 -
Worth saying as well though, a 5lb loss on you will physically look very different than a 5lb loss on someone much heavier. It will be very apparent on you, on someone 200lbs not so much.3
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I agree that if you increase your activity by walking more while keeping calorie intake the same, you absolutely can lose weight. I love to walk, and do a lot of walking over the course of a week. However, if you want to crunch the numbers, it doesn't actually burn the same per mile as running, and for me, neither burns 100 calories per mile. At least, according to the article below. At the bottom they give you formulas for NET calories burned walking or running a mile. For me, at 135 lbs, it's about 85 calories burned per mile of running, and 40 calories per mile walking. So when I go for walks or runs, these are the numbers I now use.
https://www.google.com/amp/www.runnersworld.com/weight-loss/how-many-calories-are-you-really-burning?amp
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GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »It's all about creating a calorie deficit.
Walking can help you do that, and getting more activity in your day is always a good thing. I'm a big fan of walking. But if you don't have a handle on your food intake, all the walking in the world won't do anything for you.
This.
My main form of activity has been walking and I've lost a lot of weight. But you have to watch your diet too.0 -
I know this does nothing to address your question (the OPs above have done that) but KEEP WALKING WITH YOUR MOM. The benefit you'll get from being together, in the long, long run is priceless. Lost my mom 2 years ago, would love to walk with her now.9
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Christine_72 wrote: »I'll never be a runner, maybe if i was in a hurry to get my exercise in, or in a rush to get from A to B i'd consider it, but until then walking suits me just fine, You can burn a ton of calories too
You pretty much burn the same as running the same distance, you just do it slower. 5km walk vs 5km run/jog will roughly be the same thing. One will take 30min the other 1hour.
For some of us the run will be only minutely slower than the walk
(working on it because it's fun and because of ego...)1 -
lightenup2016 wrote: »I agree that if you increase your activity by walking more while keeping calorie intake the same, you absolutely can lose weight. I love to walk, and do a lot of walking over the course of a week. However, if you want to crunch the numbers, it doesn't actually burn the same per mile as running, and for me, neither burns 100 calories per mile. At least, according to the article below. At the bottom they give you formulas for NET calories burned walking or running a mile. For me, at 135 lbs, it's about 85 calories burned per mile of running, and 40 calories per mile walking. So when I go for walks or runs, these are the numbers I now use.
https://www.google.com/amp/www.runnersworld.com/weight-loss/how-many-calories-are-you-really-burning?amp
Something is wrong with those numbers. The 85 calories/mile is a very reasonable estimate for a small person (and quite consistent with "about" 100 cals as a rough estimate; I think I even suggested she might be down around 80ish because she's so small). Running does not burn double the calories per mile compared to walking. It burns slightly more - but the difference would be more like 80 vs 100. I think they have their "per hour" and their "per mile" concepts mixed up.
My weight loss - where almost all my physical activity has been walking-based - backs up my walking estimate.0 -
RiiNaCHiiCK09 wrote: »Could just walking and diet help me lose my last 15 lbs? I know jogging would be better, but could walking be as effective for me as it has for my mom?
If your calorie counting is accurate, and you are eating less than you burn, then yes, it's just as effective. But take a look at the differences, she's taller, so she can eat more and get away with more. For you to have a similar deficit as hers and stay above 1200 calories a day, you'll have to do more exercise than her. It's just a simple fact of her being taller/larger.
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SusanMFindlay wrote: »lightenup2016 wrote: »I agree that if you increase your activity by walking more while keeping calorie intake the same, you absolutely can lose weight. I love to walk, and do a lot of walking over the course of a week. However, if you want to crunch the numbers, it doesn't actually burn the same per mile as running, and for me, neither burns 100 calories per mile. At least, according to the article below. At the bottom they give you formulas for NET calories burned walking or running a mile. For me, at 135 lbs, it's about 85 calories burned per mile of running, and 40 calories per mile walking. So when I go for walks or runs, these are the numbers I now use.
https://www.google.com/amp/www.runnersworld.com/weight-loss/how-many-calories-are-you-really-burning?amp
Something is wrong with those numbers. The 85 calories/mile is a very reasonable estimate for a small person (and quite consistent with "about" 100 cals as a rough estimate; I think I even suggested she might be down around 80ish because she's so small). Running does not burn double the calories per mile compared to walking. It burns slightly more - but the difference would be more like 80 vs 100. I think they have their "per hour" and their "per mile" concepts mixed up.
My weight loss - where almost all my physical activity has been walking-based - backs up my walking estimate.
I think they're saying the difference is that with running you have to push your weight entirely off the ground, whereas with walking there's always one foot on the ground, so therefore, the effort and calorie burn for running is higher even per mile. Also, with these being net calories burned, the difference is more pronounced.
I haven't really been able to calculate if the numbers work, but I figure I'll just stick with the lower numbers.
OP--definitely keep walking or running if you enjoy it!1 -
I've lost 25 pounds in 8 weeks by just counting calories and walking on the treadmillRiiNaCHiiCK09 wrote: »So I've been told time and time again that for a person who weighs "more"(whatever more means),the first 20lbs is "easier" than the last 15 lbs for a smaller person.
I'm so sorry if that came out wrong or offensive, but let me get to my point.
Before my son, I was 105 lbs. I am now 120 lbs. Oh and I'm 4' 11" if that helps with anything.
Well, I just started counting calories and walking with my mom. She has lost 25 pounds from that, but she is 5' 4" and starting weight was 212 lbs.
Could just walking and diet help me lose my last 15 lbs? I know jogging would be better, but could walking be as effective for me as it has for my mom?
0 -
Christine_72 wrote: »I'll never be a runner, maybe if i was in a hurry to get my exercise in, or in a rush to get from A to B i'd consider it, but until then walking suits me just fine, You can burn a ton of calories too
You pretty much burn the same as running the same distance, you just do it slower. 5km walk vs 5km run/jog will roughly be the same thing. One will take 30min the other 1hour.
That's been my experience. When my arthritis is flaring, I don't manage to run as much. I can walk. I can keep my calorie burn consistent by keeping my mileage consistent.0 -
SusanMFindlay wrote: »lightenup2016 wrote: »I agree that if you increase your activity by walking more while keeping calorie intake the same, you absolutely can lose weight. I love to walk, and do a lot of walking over the course of a week. However, if you want to crunch the numbers, it doesn't actually burn the same per mile as running, and for me, neither burns 100 calories per mile. At least, according to the article below. At the bottom they give you formulas for NET calories burned walking or running a mile. For me, at 135 lbs, it's about 85 calories burned per mile of running, and 40 calories per mile walking. So when I go for walks or runs, these are the numbers I now use.
https://www.google.com/amp/www.runnersworld.com/weight-loss/how-many-calories-are-you-really-burning?amp
Something is wrong with those numbers. The 85 calories/mile is a very reasonable estimate for a small person (and quite consistent with "about" 100 cals as a rough estimate; I think I even suggested she might be down around 80ish because she's so small). Running does not burn double the calories per mile compared to walking. It burns slightly more - but the difference would be more like 80 vs 100. I think they have their "per hour" and their "per mile" concepts mixed up.
My weight loss - where almost all my physical activity has been walking-based - backs up my walking estimate.
I agree with you and my weight loss/TDEE from walking agrees with this. The runner's world numbers for walking have always been low, imo.
Bear in mind that I run as well. I have a Fitbit and get a burn that's on order of what you're saying for each activity, and that's pretty consistent with the scale performance for me.
The Runner's World numbers aren't.1
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